US jury finds Bill Cosby sexually assaulted teen in 1970s

Invoice Cosby. (File picture: AP)

LOS ANGELES: Invoice Cosby sexually assaulted a youngster on the Playboy Mansion virtually 50 years in the past, a jury in California discovered Tuesday, within the first civil ruling in opposition to the veteran entertainer following dozens of allegations.
Judy Huth, now aged 64, was awarded $500,000 in damages after the jury in Santa Monica decided that Cosby had molested her in 1975 when she was simply 16 years previous after assembly her on a film set and plying her with alcohol.
The case is the one profitable authorized motion in opposition to Cosby, 84, who has been accused of utilizing his fame to prey on ladies over a number of a long time.
The person previously often known as “America’s Dad” was jailed in Pennsylvania for drugging and molesting a girl in a separate legal case in 2018, however was freed final yr when his conviction was overturned on a technicality.
Over a two-week civil listening to, which Cosby didn’t attend, legal professionals stated he escorted Huth and her then-17-year-old pal, Donna Samuelson, to Hugh Hefner’s mansion after assembly them on a film set.
The jury heard how when Huth was alone with Cosby, the actor started kissing her and tried to place his palms inside her garments.
They had been advised how he then allegedly pulled down his personal trousers and compelled her to carry out a intercourse act on him.
Lawyer Nathan Goldberg stated for a few years Huth had repressed recollections of the assault however that it got here to the fore for her when different ladies started accusing him of assaulting them.
“It was like a cork popped out of a bottle,” stated Goldberg at the beginning of the case. “Reminiscences got here speeding to the floor… she turned overwhelmed by recollections of Mr Cosby and what he had accomplished.”
She initially filed her lawsuit in December 2014, however the case was placed on maintain whereas numerous legal investigations performed out.
The civil trial was proven a videotaped deposition of Cosby taken in 2015 wherein he denied the assault, and insisted that he would by no means have interaction in sexual exercise with an underage lady.
His legal professionals made a lot of obvious discrepancies in Huth’s story, together with that each teenagers spent as much as 12 hours on the mansion after the alleged assault.
Additionally they argued that Huth initially claimed the assault occurred in 1974 when she was 15, however later stated it had occurred the next yr.
The case was by no means prosecuted criminally because the statute of limitations had handed by the point Huth spoke to police.
California regulation permits adults who say they had been sexually abused as minors, however have solely lately grow to be conscious of the injury, to convey civil instances years after the statute of limitations would usually have expired.
Cosby was a towering determine in late-Twentieth century American widespread tradition, and hit the large time as affable obstetrician and father Cliff Huxtable on “The Cosby Present,” which ran from 1984-92.
However round 60 ladies, lots of them onetime aspiring actresses and fashions, have publicly branded Cosby a calculating, serial predator who plied victims with sedatives and alcohol to mattress them over 4 a long time.